It's Showtime! But why do we care?

It's October- the month for all kinds of exhibits and shows. So far this month I have attended the world's largest in-water sailboat show, the world's largest antique automobile show, and a very sizeable Pack Expo Las Vegas show. These experiences, stacked back to back, have me thinking about why I attend shows. I can categorize the reasons into four areas.

Curiosity -The need to be educated
Projects -The occasional need to buy something
Data mining - The need to locate information resources or internet URL's
Relationships - The need to interact with my peers

Curiosity
Whether traversing the docks at the sailboat show, the fields at the car show, or the halls at Pack Expo, education and curiosity are at the top of the list for why I subject myself to these shows. When one is a new engineer or new to a hobby, these shows are great places to be educated. And, as one gains some experience in the field, there develops a great curiosity about all that you now know that you don’t know.

When I was in the big corporate world and attending packaging shows in the US and Europe, it was our policy to focus our time on the vendors that we were unfamiliar with to look for innovation. We were careful to not allow our existing suppliers to occupy our time with big booth tours, refreshment breaks, side-tours and entertainment. These were categorized as "account control" activities that kept us from exercising our curiosity about new vendors with unusual solutions. After debriefing at daily team meetings, the less experienced among us would be directed to exhibits and activities that would further their education of the industry while others would be directed to booths to dig deeper into issues that fit their particular curiosity or expertise.

Projects
I occasionally attend a show with the intent of buying something. Exhibitors and sponsors want to believe that this happens more than it actually does. True, I did make a special effort to get to a couple of boat shows on the East coast the year I bought my boat. But, in the final analysis, I would probably have found the same boat and the same deal without the shows. Maybe it would have taken me longer, and I wouldn't have learned as much in the process, but the project would have been completed.

During my career, I have attended a lot of packaging and other industrial shows, but never with the intent of buying something at one of them. Active projects direct one's curiosity to limit the scope of the visit to what one's feet can endure. Anyway, telling your boss that you need to attend a show because of a project requirement sounds a lot better than telling him that you need to attend to satisfy your curiosity.

Data mining
Our e-connected world has changed the nature of big shows. I used to spend hours hunting for car parts at the car show, but now I hunt for URL's of people or businesses that may have the parts that I need. After spending years looking for some date-authentic original shocks for my March 1929 model A, I learned that E-bay is the best and least-tiring place to shop for parts when you know exactly what you want. Similarly, I collected a list of URL's at the boat show for things that I will likely purchase before the start of the Spring sailing season.

Packaging shows aren't much different. The use of streaming video on suppliers' websites has greatly enhanced the value of data mining by collecting URL's. One picture is worth a thousand words and a video is worth a hundred still photos. Sometimes the search engines just don't turn up the sites you want – sometimes because you don't know what you want. Hunting URL's is a good thing at shows – and they don't weigh you down or take up space in your luggage!

Relationships
Building and maintaining relationships are the most important reasons for attending shows. Relationships are not enhanced by our e-connected world. We can't data mine for relationships; our projects don't last as long as our relationships; and our curiosity can sometimes blind us to our relationships. But meeting with peers, sharing ideas, gaining new insights, breaking bread together, cooperating on task forces ….. these are the activities that make shows worth while.

The sailboat show builds relationships with my son and son-in-law who share the hobby with me. The car show builds relationships with friends who share a love of old machinery and who help one another to find or restore that special part. Pack Expo gives me an opportunity to meet with professional colleagues spanning a career of 35 years and with youngsters still in school and just thinking about careers in packaging.

As promoters adapt to the evolving place of shows in our e-connected world, the focus needs to be on how to enhance the building and maintaining of personal relationships through the show venues. We need more work groups, more leadership opportunities, more time to meet in small groups over some refreshment, and more time to informally share ideas. Do you agree? I welcome your ideas.

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Comments Keith, I wish I had known you would be at Pack Expo. Love to see you and catch up. I've made your blog one of my "favorites", so you'll probably see something from me soon. Take care, Richard Posted by: Richard Koch on November 1, 2007 Post a comment (If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.) Name: Email Address: URL: Remember personal info? Comments: (you may use HTML tags for style)